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The Common Core Costs Billions and Hurts Students

nytimes.com

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Re: The Common Core Costs Billions and Hurts Students

#21

Post by 2k03kv4r5p »

WalterBright wrote: post #18

> Children starting in the third grade may spend more than 10 hours a year taking state tests — and weeks preparing for them. I don't really understand the issue there. There's about 900 hours/year of instruction, and 10 hours of that being tests doesn't seem like a large burden. Secondly, "preparing for the tests" sounds like "learning", what is supposed to be happening. The article also complains about the inept im…

>I don't see why the tests can't be administered on paper and have the teachers grade them.

Standardized tests are used to evaluate teachers and schools. Given the chance, teachers and school administrators will cheat on them.

By the way, teacher's union desires that their performance not be evaluated is a source of motivated reasoning on this topic, so be skeptical.

Re: The Common Core Costs Billions and Hurts Students

#22

Post by tzs »

dalke wrote: post #4
jcbeard wrote: post #2

You know, as a parent I'd heard many things about "Common Core" from the media, other parents, and even family members. When my son got to kindergarten I was a bit worried about overbearing tests and the lack of a tried and true teaching method. Well, what we got were concepts. In kindergarten, my son learned things that I recognized as basic number theory...almost as if it came straight out of Andrew's book of the s…

We had curriculum standards well before Common Core. What specifically from Common Core enabled what you saw, in way which wasn't done before? > "we need to divorce the common core from the testing standards" The only reason Common Core exists is to have testing standards. Otherwise, without tests, a teacher is free to pick and choose. Which is what we had before this era of high stakes testing. Also, Common Core was…

I don't see anything in Common Core that would make a curriculum following the Common Core standards easier to teach than a curriculum that does not follow it.

Here is the English Language Arts standard: http://www.corestandards.org/ELA-Literacy/

Here is the Mathematics standard: http://www.corestandards.org/Math/

Re: The Common Core Costs Billions and Hurts Students

#23

Post by dmoy »

rayiner wrote: post #13
jcbeard wrote: post #2

You know, as a parent I'd heard many things about "Common Core" from the media, other parents, and even family members. When my son got to kindergarten I was a bit worried about overbearing tests and the lack of a tried and true teaching method. Well, what we got were concepts. In kindergarten, my son learned things that I recognized as basic number theory...almost as if it came straight out of Andrew's book of the s…

> Likely spending $1.59m per cruise missile is part of it, and the other part what we seem to value in society....locking people up vs. fixing the core issues Cruise missles have nothing to do with it. We spend more on education per capita than any other developed country besides Switzerland. And our best performing school districts often spend a fraction of what our worst school districts spend per student. We don't…

Yea this is key. You can't teach a kid who is hungry, or worried about more pressing issues.

Re: The Common Core Costs Billions and Hurts Students

#24

Post by elgabogringo »

Would we buy "Government Software"? What about "Government computers"? Any of you tried to go to the California DMV's in the Bay Area lately? How is Government single-payer health care (the VA) working out for veterans?

Given this sentiment why do we feel like single-payer Government schools are the answer to educating our children?

I just don't see how we can get incentives inside of a government system to align with our goals of efficiently educating our children.

Re: The Common Core Costs Billions and Hurts Students

#25

Post by Clanan »

jcbeard wrote: post #2

You know, as a parent I'd heard many things about "Common Core" from the media, other parents, and even family members. When my son got to kindergarten I was a bit worried about overbearing tests and the lack of a tried and true teaching method. Well, what we got were concepts. In kindergarten, my son learned things that I recognized as basic number theory...almost as if it came straight out of Andrew's book of the s…

Why do we focus so much on the educational method, and whether or not teachers can tackle it? Here's the key line in your comment:

    What he missed though was the ability to calculate quickly...this I had to get him to do at home...
I think the biggest problem in U.S. education today, and why us throwing money at it isn't working, is that parents do not take a "leadership" role in their child's education. Common Core was fine because you eliminated the weak points. But I think it's far more common for parents to abdicate responsibility for educating their children to schools and teachers. And society basically reinforces this idea. Many of my successful, educated friends are barely involved in their kids' educations, only making sure homework gets done, yet they don't realize they could do so much more! Schools and teachers don't (and can't) care more about your children than you do, so I think we need to see a re-centering of responsibility back onto parents.

And yes, I know the common response is that many parents simply do not have time to be more involved. But the average American watches >2 hours of TV daily (never-mind Facebook usage), so I think parents would be more involved if the "system" incentivized and encouraged it.

Re: The Common Core Costs Billions and Hurts Students

#26

Post by Broken_Hippo »

WalterBright wrote: post #18

> Children starting in the third grade may spend more than 10 hours a year taking state tests — and weeks preparing for them. I don't really understand the issue there. There's about 900 hours/year of instruction, and 10 hours of that being tests doesn't seem like a large burden. Secondly, "preparing for the tests" sounds like "learning", what is supposed to be happening. The article also complains about the inept im…

It has been some time since I've been in school, but I still remember that horribleness of the standardized test. You spend weeks hearing how important it is, and we spent days sitting there still, in silence, filling in the correct multiple choice answer on a sheet with a #2 pencil, hoping the teacher didn't think we were cheating if we were stretching. For hours and hours at a time. The tests took a few days. They told us (perhaps wrongly) that we couldn't miss school during that time. Sometimes we were told we'd be deducted for having a wrong answer, sometimes not. I'd rather do college finals each year or split the stuff up over the course of the school year so it is less of a burden.

The reason teachers can't grade them is because the schools use them to grade the school and the teacher - some states, it determines funding for the schools. Too low of a grade and you lose funding, meet the goals and you gain.

Re: The Common Core Costs Billions and Hurts Students

#27

Post by devonkim »

rayiner wrote: post #13
jcbeard wrote: post #2

You know, as a parent I'd heard many things about "Common Core" from the media, other parents, and even family members. When my son got to kindergarten I was a bit worried about overbearing tests and the lack of a tried and true teaching method. Well, what we got were concepts. In kindergarten, my son learned things that I recognized as basic number theory...almost as if it came straight out of Andrew's book of the s…

> Likely spending $1.59m per cruise missile is part of it, and the other part what we seem to value in society....locking people up vs. fixing the core issues Cruise missles have nothing to do with it. We spend more on education per capita than any other developed country besides Switzerland. And our best performing school districts often spend a fraction of what our worst school districts spend per student. We don't…

We only need to ask teachers that have worked with students in these underperforming schools and you'll see a pattern emerge - students that are not having their needs at home met are oftentimes not able to come prepared to learn at school. Furthermore, children in impoverished families tend to have to move frequently (parents have unstable incomes and unstable rent) and this disrupts social bonds as well as continuous learning.

Trying to spend more money on education when children don't have basic needs like clean running water and food at home is complete nonsense and our expensive, ineffective programs are reflective of this double standard and a form of siloized, segregated government policies and departments that cannot tackle widespread, complex problems. This isn't to say that private sector would do any better though.

Re: The Common Core Costs Billions and Hurts Students

#28

Post by tzs »

Common Core has attracted some rather far out criticism. I have not been able to decide whether this is amusing or appalling.

It "will promote double-mindedness in state education and attract every one of your children to become as homosexual as they possibly can", according to Florida State Rep. Charles Van Zant (R) [1].

Similar criticism from the American Family Association [2]. If it is not stopped, the only way for Christians to survive will be to form a parallel society with its own jobs and economy [3].

According to Glenn Beck, "that's why I think common core is here, because it will train us to be a serf state, it will train us and it will keep us in order to answer to the Chinese or whoever it is". (He thinks we'll be ruled by an American technocrat under the control of China, with China employing Muslims as enforcers to keep us in line). Video of Beck covering this here [4]. Summary here [5].

According to Dr. Karen Effrem, president of Education Liberty Watch, creates "a womb-to-tomb dossier on kids and families" that includes between 300 and 400 different data points, such as parents’ voting status, religious affiliation, medical data, newborn screening and genetic data [6].

[1] http://thinkprogress.org/lgbt/2014/05/19/3439163/state-rep-c...

[2] http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/rios-schools-no-longer...

[3] http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/sandy-rios-fears-child...

[4] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tUIGMhgN1Iw&feature=youtu.be

[5] http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/beck-common-core-desig...

[6] http://www.wnd.com/2014/01/nsa-ops-walk-in-park-next-to-plan...

Re: The Common Core Costs Billions and Hurts Students

#29

Post by justin_vanw »

elgabogringo wrote: post #24

Would we buy "Government Software"? What about "Government computers"? Any of you tried to go to the California DMV's in the Bay Area lately? How is Government single-payer health care (the VA) working out for veterans? Given this sentiment why do we feel like single-payer Government schools are the answer to educating our children? I just don't see how we can get incentives inside of a government system to align wit…

Why does the DMV even exist? If we didn't have driving tests, would it really matter at all? Do we need all this paperwork to own a car?

What if we didn't have any of it at all? Does anyone think that some 16 year old who barely passes the driving test is any better of a driver than that same 16 year old who didn't have to take the test?

The DMV just shouldn't exist. We could abolish it tomorrow, fire all the employees, and spend the money on useful things. Literally nothing would happen, nothing would change.

Re: The Common Core Costs Billions and Hurts Students

#30

Post by justin_vanw »

elgabogringo wrote: post #24

Would we buy "Government Software"? What about "Government computers"? Any of you tried to go to the California DMV's in the Bay Area lately? How is Government single-payer health care (the VA) working out for veterans? Given this sentiment why do we feel like single-payer Government schools are the answer to educating our children? I just don't see how we can get incentives inside of a government system to align wit…

So 'single payer government schools' work fine in areas where the adults are themselves educated. They work poorly in areas where the adults are not well educated. No variable you can change will make a dramatic impact.

If the parents aren't educated, they can't tell whether the school is good or bad. In that case, they are going to be conned by charlatans, it's just a question of government charlatans or private charlatans.

If the parents are educated, they won't send their kids to a crappy school, and will either use money saved by living in a worse school district to help pay for private school, or will move. Either way, educated parents who care will not send their kids to garbage schools.

The net of all that is that dumber, less educated people will end up with dumber, less educated children because they don't know how to get their children a good education, or even how to tell the difference between good and bad schools. How you pay the bill or how you organize it will not matter, and studies have shown this over and over.

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